Regarding the discussion last week on the nature of Islam, an excellent analyst of Islam is Bill Warner of Political Islam. He breaks it down by percentages and explains how the parts about us, infidels, are political in nature, and are apparently much more than half—61 percent in fact. So if the Koran and Hadiths are about us, doesn’t that sort of make it our business?

LA replies:

Exactly right. As I’ve said before, insofar as your average, “Five Pillars” Muslim believer is concerned in his day to day life, Islam is a religion, but insofar as Islam is about the evil of infidels and what should be done to them, Islam is an ideology of war and subjugation. And that is the part of Islam that is of interest to us. And if Warner is right that 61 percent of the Koran and hadiths are about infidels, then it is reasonable to state that Islam is less than half religion and more than half war ideology.

But even if the parts about infidels were less than half, it would not change what Islam is for us, namely a doctrine for our destruction.

We can call Islam a political ideology that commands the killing and subjugation of non-Muslims, or we can call it a religion that commands the killing and subjugation of non-Muslims. Both formulations are correct. However, at the moment, I’m leaning more toward Bill Carpenter’s definition:

I think the simplest approach is to regard Islam as a religion that requires its adherents to exterminate, enslave, or otherwise suppress all non-adherents. That is, we should regard Islam as a religion that is incompatible with Christianity, Judaism, and any other religion, and, indeed, incompatible with any non-Muslim system of human existence.